thepassionatecook

Venison fillet with portwine & orange sauce on fresh cep mushrooms

On my recent trip to Austria, I had a wonderfully leisurely lunch at a great restaurant in Salzburg - the Purzelbaum. Leaving everything on the menu aside that didn't immediately yell "Austrian", I ordered pumkin soup with pumpkin seed oil, apricot dumplings and an absolutely amazing main of venison.
Being a foodblogger, I have a nasty habit of re-creating a lot of the restaurant dishes I like in my own kitchen and this was no exception. We had some friends over who are probably the best guests you could wish for, as they eat absolutely everything - no allergies, no special diets and certainly no pickiness. So I had to seize the opportunity and make something other people might be hesitant about and so I decided on venison even if it is not the height of the season. The thing though is that here in the UK we are incredibly lucky to have some dedicated producers who rear game in their own parks and can pretty much provide meat all year round - whether breeding deer for consumption like domestic animals affects the quality of the meat, I can't say. The fillet I got last weekend was absolutely perfect, in any case, very tasty meat and very, very lean, but incredibly tender.
So there I was, in my own kitchen, doing my best to mirror what I had had at the Purzelbaum a few weeks earlier: fillet of venison, pan-seared and cut into medallions, an aromatic sauce which I made with portwine and orange juice, fresh cep mushrooms sauteed with shallots and parsley, bread dumplings with black truffles and fruity red cabbage. Unfortunately, I had to use one of the things I loathe and this experiment proved it again: as fresh truffles were nowhere to be found, I had to resort to supermarket truffles in a glass... which might have been OK visually, but added absolutely nothing to the taste. I could just have left them out, but I can be a bit stubborn at times ;-)
But all in all, this is something that will get a firm place in my repertoire - not only was the venison tasty and gorgeous, it was easy to make and I fell in love with the sides which were really good enough to have on their own... recipes here!
And before you cry out "ah, but the meat is overcooked!" - I can assure you it wasn't... but in the heat of preparations, I completely forgot to get our my camera and could only take a picture of left-overs the next day and of course, the meat had rested too much by then... it was perfect the night before though!

Wurstsalat or: the Austrian way to do picnics

Austrians are not what you would call a nation of picnickers. Not sure why this is, but there are only three occasions that I can think of where you bring your food and consume it in full view of others: Firstly, although rapidly disappearing nowadays, you can still find certain "Heurigen" (establishments where local wine producers are licensed to sell only their own produce, sometimes restricted to just a couple of weeks every autumn) where you're allowed or expected to bring our own food while you consume the house wine on the premises, secondly, when you go hiking and bring dry-cured sausages, some cheese and bread (in the case of our family mostly in a battered tin box rather than tupperware) and thirdly, when you go to spend a day on the lake.
I guess there are two main reasons that prevent us Austrians to frolick and indulge on our picnic blankets... one is that, unlike London, you'd be hard-pressed to find a space in an urban park, as most green spaces are inaccessible to the public and apart from "don't step on the lawn" signs left, right and centre, you have park patrol keeping a vigilant eye on anyone attempting to break the rules. So you'd find yourself restricted to the few park benches scattered along the paths, which are usually occupied by the elderly taking a well-deserved break or some homeless wino sleeping his alcohol levels down to a reasonable level.
But apart from the difficulty of finding a suitable space, there is a common negative attitude towards eating in public. Despite there being many shops and kiosks where you can grab a quick bite, eating in public is frowned upon and you're really expected to either consume your purchase in the immediate perimeter of the locale or take it whereever the wind blows you next, be that your work place or your home. If you attempt to eat your hot dog in a tram or on a bus, you're most likely to lose your appetite altogether under the scornful eyes of some old ladies... and we all know such specimens, don't we?
So the rare occasions where we enjoyed our lunch al fresco was usually in summer, when we headed for some mountainous lake or even just a nature pond in the vicinity of my hometown to spend a day in the sun. On such days, my Mum would prepare a "Wurstsalat" (I will spare you the literal translation as it is bound to evoke the wrong pictures in your head and ruin your appetite). We use "Extrawurst" or "Knacker", a cold meat similar to some luncheon sausages you can get round here, the ingredients of which are not far from a Frankfurter or Wiener, a hard cheese (like Emmental or Gruyère), onions, tomatoes and sweet peppers, thinly slice all of it and dress it with a simple vinaigrette. Straight out of the coolbox and with a crusty baguette on the side, I cannot think of anything more refreshing on a hot summer's day...

Creamy spinach with roast potatoes and and egg: Spinat mit Spiegelei

This used to be one of my favourite dishes when I was a child: so much so that I even dressed up as it for our carnival parties... here's the proof! It is also a dish that has become closely linked to the Thursday before Easter, which in Austria is goes by the name of "Gründonnerstag". Upon investigation it appears that it wasn't to reflect our culinary traditions that this day was called "Green Thursday", but a closer look at its ethymology reveals that in Old German, as well as in some Austrian dialects nowadays, "greinen" means "to groan, to weep, to mourn" and this is where the name for the day of the Last Supper originates. Falsely interpreted, it soon became tradition to bring out green ornaments in Church as well as eat something green - herbs, salad, but more traditionally spinach. Similar to advent, my family used to observe the Easter traditions carefully - we had to give something up for lent (back then it was most likely to be sweets, nowadays, I give up beetroot ;-)) and this would be pretty much be the last real meal before the real fasting began which lasted until the early hours on Easter Sunday (or very late the day before for us kids). Maybe that's how I've come to like it so much!!!
I should have thought about posting this in the Easter week, but might as well serve it up now: not long now before spinach season, with the first field-grown baby spinach arriving at our stalls in late spring, early summer.
Most people don't make this from scratch, but usually buy the blocks of spinach puréed and frozen at the supermarket to only add the finshing touches (garlic, sour cream etc). It's incredibly easy to make, though, and tastes so much better. To achieve a real thick and creamy spinach, you prepare a béchamel sauce as a base, then add the blanched/steamed leaves, purée and season to taste. This can be served as an accompaniment, especially with Tafelspitz (recipe at end of post), but it's just a scrumptuous eaten on its own.

Vienna restaurant: Plachutta - and a recipe for Tafelspitz

Plachutta really is an institution. Even by Austrian standards. In a town that has just embarked on the 5th millennium (that is: 5,000 years!) of its existence and has a long tradition of eating well (and eating lots!), the competition is understandably fierce and restaurants come and go... It may be relatively easy to gain a clientèle by venturing into new cuisines (a "new wave" of Asian eateries in the last five years being one example), but to gain considerable market share doing traditional Viennese food with thousands of pubs, inns and restaurants out there doing just the same, is quite an achievement by any standard. Especially when you consider that there are so many establishments out there some of which have had a long history of serving food to a loyal following of diners since the late 19th century (or longer) and are still going strong.
For many, Plachutta is the hallmark of Viennese cuisine. Their three restaurants, as well as a newer venture in the form of an up-market beer garden, vouch for quality and have become the benchmark for the competition ever since they took over the Hietzinger Braeu as late as 1987. They attract large crowds of people throughout the year, locals as well as the occasional passing tourists, and the walls are studded with photographs of celebrities who were well advised to make a visit to this establishment a must on their culinary itinerary.
But not only are his restaurants celebrating a phenomenal success, their founder Ewald Plachutta has also established himself as the undisputed expert in Austrian culinary heritage and his first book is almost as widespread in Austrian households as the bible in the Vatican. Whether it's recipes for traditional Austrian dishes or a crashcourse in the most basic of techniques, he deals with it all. He's my first point of reference for all questions on Austrian food, and the same for most Austrians I know... the condition of my personal copy of this "bible" of cookbooks speaks volumes! The broken back of the book, the pages full of fingerprints and splashmarks all over are living proof that I got a lot of bang for my buck here!
When you have a booking at Plachutta's, Tafelspitz is the order of the day. By far the most traditional of Viennese dishes, if you ask people in the know. A Wiener Schnitzel and Apfelstrudel can be had anywhere in the country, but Tafelspitz is something unique to these latitudes. If you are tempted to ask what's so special about a cut of beef boiled in broth for hours, you're definitely missing the point. In order to understand the Tafelspitz, you must have experienced it the real, ie the Plachutta, way!
Tafelspitz is actually a specific cut of beef, similar to a silverside and it's the most widely used. However, there are more than ten other cuts on offer and they all will be served in a rich, clear broth, brought to the table in beautiful, large copper pans. You first enjoy the soup, with vegetables and your choice of accompaniment: Fritatten (thin strips of savoury pancake), vermicelli noodles, Schoeberl (a sort of savoury sponge with ham) or dumplings, depending on the daily offering. Then, you spread some crisply toasted rye bread thinly with bone marrow before tucking into your main course. It is custom to ladle some soup over the meat, then sprinkle it with fleur de sel. You enjoy it with two types of sauces: a chive breadsauce and an apple-horseradish one, as well as straw potatoes (nests of julienned potatoes, deep-fried), spinach and other vegetables.
Now, if you're planning a trip to Vienna, make a point of booking at Plachutta's - I personally prefer the restaurant in the Wollzeile, which also lends itself for a stroll in the adjacent Stadtpark with its Johann Strauss statue and airs of Waltz accompanying you as you walk, no, waltz through the park... an unforgettable experience! And if you're smart enough to skip the dessert at Plachutta's, drop in at the Kurkonditorei Oberlaa, on the other end of the park from Plachutta's near the Hilton Hotel, where you can sample excellent Austrian pastries and cakes - they're so good you'll find yourself wishing they had a tasting menu for you to sample a little bite of it all!

Pear & sage-stuffed chicken breast with a hazelnut crust

I am back in London after a week in chilly Austria, which brought some highlights, but wasn't alltogether that relaxing. The most annoying thing, I guess, is that I didn't manage to get tables at the restaurants that I most wanted to visit - mostly due to the fact that it is carnival and therefore "Ballsaison" (ballroom dancing galore) and people seem to like a decent meal somewhere before hitting the dancefloor. Going to a ball certainly has many highlights, but food is usually not one of them - apart from goulash soup (an incarnation of the traditional Hungarian gulyas), a pair of Frankfurter sausages with a dry breadroll and a toasted ham & cheese sandwich, your options are limited and more often than not, you will be paying extortionate amounts for very basic food. I say this on the evening of Vienna's most famous of balls, the Opernball. If you have 215 Euros to spare for a single ticket and don't mind to be on a waiting list for years, do go and tell me about the food there. I'd like to think that it is more sophisticated than your usual fare, but it certainly won't come cheaper!
I had been planning to go to one of my favourite restaurants in Vienna (Gaumenspiel), but they were having a private event the evening I wanted to go and were closed for all the alternative dates I suggested. Angelika did manage to book a table for a leisurely Monday lunch at one of Austria's top tables (Restaurant Meinl am Graben, much coveted under the helmet of Christian Petz, but now with a new head chef), but it failed to impress. However, I made sure to have lunch at a real institution of the Viennese restaurant scene and will blog about it in due course.
And as I am doing more packing and unpacking, but am mainly occupied with dreading the move ahead, I can only unveil dishes I served up a while ago that haven't made it live yet. One of them is actually a Viennese dish, if somewhat bastardised: Backhendlsalat traditionally is a dish of potato salad with breaded chicken goujons. It's really something you're likely to encounter in any corner restaurant or coffee shop in Austria's capital and probably owes its popularity to being so predictable.
Before the advent of H5N1, I liked to play around with this dish a lot, trying different stuffings and coatings and varying the accompaniments all the time. Here, I used pear and sage for a stuffing and a crust of hazelnut breadcrumbs, which felt comfortably autumnal and refreshing at the same time. With a side of mashed potato (always a winner with me) and salad of lamb's lettuce and crispy bacon bits, this is a perfect fit for a lazy Sunday evening... I'll even turn a blind eye should you choose to down a can of beer with it!

Zwiebelrostbraten: beef escalope with crispy onions

With continental, or rather Central and Eastern European cuisine being the new kid on the restaurant scene ever since the new member states joined the EU and helped, largely, by the incredible success that seems to be The Wolseley, you might think that traditional Austrian food has become so mainstream that I'd be running out of dishes to write about. Much to the contrary!

It just goes to prove that those dishes that I found myself growing a bit tired of during my childhood have now all reason to be dusted off and brought out into the spotlight. Even more so as said establishment, which offers a round-the-clock menu in the tradition of great Viennese coffee houses, does an eclectic mix of French bistro meets Austrian Kaffeehaus culture and sadly offers but the usual suspects. Hasn't everyone grown tired of the Wiener Schnitzel by now? (I'll actually have to go one day to see if their Wiener has what it takes!)

Diving deep into the memories of my childhood, or rather uncovering what are my husband's memories of his, as my family was never that big on meat, I made Zwiebelrostbraten the other day. This is a very special treat at my mother-in-law's, usually on the menu for big occasions like birthdays or long-overdue family gatherings. There are two ways of preparing this dish and which one people choose will largely depend on the quality of meat they bought. The lower the quality, the longer you'll have to cook the escalopes and this is usually done with the onions inside the gravy. But I like my onions nice and crisp, which is why I prefer the (Viennese) version where you deep-fry the onions and let them crisp up on some kitchen towel, so I always go for a rumpsteak or fillet, which I just need to flash-fry in the pan, then let warm through in the sauce for just a few minutes. Top with the crispy onion rings, serve with some fried potatoes... nothing for the cholesterol-conscious among you, but surely some great, hearty flavours that will have you hooked!

Bauernbraten with freshly grated horseradish

Austria celebrates its National Holiday today and since you can't see me wearing my Dirndl or hear me yodeling, it is only appropriate to post something revolving around Austrian food... Every once in a while my local Waitrose makes me very happy by sourcing Austrian products that aren't normally accessible to me since living in the UK. Last summer, they were selling Bernerwuerstel (sausages stuffed with cheese and wrapped with pancetta) which are delicious on the barbecue - made by no other than a butcher from my hometown. Oh joy! Unfortunately, they've discontinued them, seems like they're not fit for the Britsh palate?
A couple of months ago I found some Austrian bacon on display next to the Parma ham. Handl are a Tyrolian cold meats producer and their lean bacon is sold all over the country - even though you can still get better bacon by going to small butchers and farmers in the country, their quality is very reasonable. Waitrose have now added a special baked ham, sold in wafer-thin slices, from the same company to their selection of deli items, and I bought it recently when Austria was playing England in the World Cup qualifier. I had been wandering down the high-street, seeing crowds of people heading for the pub to see the kick-off, all dressed up in their England shirts and such... and although I don't really care about whether Austria qualifies or not, no matter what the sport or who the opponent, I couldn't help a very subtle feeling of patriotism when I picked up that pack of ham. I wouldn't normally watch the game either, but I was a bit peckish, so I grated some fresh horseradish Angelika had brought me from Austria and devoured it with the ham and some rye bread, sitting in front of the television.
Although the game wasn't as embarrassing for Austria as I would have expected it to be, they did lose, of course, despite my display of support - so in the evening, we celebrated the winning team with some good old English chicken pie... isn't it great when you're so removed from it all that you can celebrate no matter who comes out on top?

Wiener Schnitzel for Dummies

For the longest time I thought it was futile to write about the most Austrian of Austrian dishes... or what is commonly perceived to be an Austrian dish, as it apparently originates in Milan. I guess we're just very good at spotting talent and hyping it enough for everybody to believe we invented it - as is the case with goulash, apple strudel and many other dishes! Last weekend, though, when I was making these yummy breaded escalopes, it dawned on me that there are many things to say about the Schnitzel... and seeing that so many get it wrong, here's the dummies' guide to our beloved Wiener:

1) Yes, that's right. For us, a Wiener is an escalope, not a sausage. We call the sausages Frankfurters.
2) Let not the Germans fool you: a Wiener Schnitzel is NEVER to be served with, let alone in sauce.
3) You want your Schnitzel crispy and crunchy. No soggy shoe sole swimming in a pool of ready-made sauce mix.
4) The thickness of the escalope is a matter of personal preference. After a heated argument over our very first Schnitzels when we had just moved in together, I convinced my (now) husband that thin is beautiful. He's now a devoted Schnitzel flattener and evenly batters them down to no more than 3 mm.
5) If you're a fan of the breadcrumb-coating (my brother used to eat the crust first, before devouring his escalope "naked"), you can make it thicker by either double-coating them or omitting the milk from the egg-mix or, like for tempura, using potato flour instead of plain flour.
6) When it comes to eating your Schnitzel, never, ever make the mistake of asking for ketchup with your Schnitzel. Here's where even my daughter gets it wrong - and you think things of this importance would be in our DNA...
7) The only condiments allowed near a Schnitzel are lemon juice (to sparingly drizzle over - you want it to cut through the grease, but don't allow the breading to go soggy) and cranberry compote. If you want to avoid dropping pips on your meat, wrap the lemon in gauze for a "safety net"...
8) There's only one exception to the condiment rule: the Schnitzelsemmel! (see top picture). This Austrian version of a hamburger (some even eat it with ketchup and mayo, although I prefer my version with fresh tomato, mustard, salad and pickled chilli) is perfect for taking leftover Schnitzel to work the following day - and a great hang-over cure, too!
9) And finally, but most importantly: No matter how much (stingy) people might insist that you can make escalopes from pork, make no mistake: only a veal Schnitzel is a real Schnitzel!

Euro-foodbloggers unite at the Henley Royal Regatta

(Fltr: Christina of Thorngrove Table, Anne of Anne's Food, yours truly the passionate cook, and the organisers of this wonderful event, Andrew of Spittoon and Jeanne, the CookSister!)
It's only our second meeting, and already we have converted the UK foodblogging event into a Euro-foodblogging event - the first meeting had already had quite an international atmosphere, with all but two foodbloggers originating from outside the UK (Australia via Ireland, Austria, Japan, Philippines and South Africa), but this time round, I actually convinced Anne, a fellow blogger from Stockholm, to spend her last weekend as a spinster on British territory. And since we've started this tradition, any other foodbloggers on the continent or indeed, elsewhere in this world, let us know if you're interested in joining the next event, to be announced soon!

If you've never been to events like Royal Ascot, Wimbledon, or the Royal Regatta at Henley, you don't know what you're missing... even if you're not invited to the Leander Club, which allows you to not only enjoy a sit-down lunch, but also to get incredibly close to the rowers' changing rooms - and those men in lycra never fail to attract!), Henley really is an institution - and a quintessentially British one, more importantly. Fancy dresses, funny hats and men's dinner jackets in incredibly bright colours (if you intend to join a rowing team, make sure the club's colours are flattering, there is some quite strange combinations out there) prevail and so do sipping Pimms or champagne and a riverside picnic. What is most impressive, though, is that it is such a civilised event, drawing a most pleasant crowd and serving up an inimitable atmosphere.
Naturally, with five food/wine bloggers amongst us, our spread attracted the most attention and I swear we could have earned a lot of money selling our delicacies there had we not been too greedy... we started out with gorgeously refreshing bellinis (choice of strawberry, passion fruit and, my personal favourite, white peach) provided by Andrew, accompanied by some duck foie gras and truffle mousse on crackers which Christina had brought along (actually all the way from Bahrain). We also nibbled on some of my salmon roly-polies and seemed to give the crudites and dips a miss, obviously overwhelmed by the quantity and quality of the home-made food laid out on our blankets.
Anne had brought some herring and knaeckebrod from Sweden, Jeanne's masterpieces were the already quite famous pecorino & peppadew muffins and a feta & butternutsquash quiche, her friend Anthony provided a fantastic mackerel pate and Christina chipped in some dessert in the form of chilli-chocolate creams.
After ruining a most delicious chocolate & cherry cake by deciding to remove the stones before throwing them on, which made the cake far too moist and undercooked at the bottom, I feared it being photographed by everybody, thus publicly embarrassing me and putting an abrupt end to my foodblogging career... so it stayed home. But I did manage to bring the afore-mentioned salmon & cream cheese roly-polies and a round bread (pain cirque) stuffed with pastrami, watercress and a sauce of gherkins, capers, parsley, mayo and mustard - somehow a combination using the concept of my fig & parma ham muffuletta using the filling previously featured in my pastrami bagels.
I also made a bacon & asparagus quiche (see picture above and recipe below) which I had seen my friend Martina prepare the other day (although hers looked much prettier) and an Austrian speciality which celebrated its absolute height in the 70s, I believe: Jaegerwecken (read Jägerwecken) is a thick baguette, stuffed with ham, cheese, gherkins, parsley, cream cheese and boiled eggs, all chopped up. It seems to have come out of fashion a bit, but it's back high up on my list, as it's the perfect picnic food - stuff the night before, wrap in foil and slice on demand... make sure you bring a bread knife, though. I forgot mine and Andrew's managed to dig a hole into the plastic bag he was carrying and fell out somewhere between the Stewart's enclosure and Remenham Farm... so I ended up cutting 30 slices with a minuscule Swiss Army knife, which wasn't exactly an easy task!

Threesome of curd dumplings on rhubarb & strawberry compote (Topfennockerl)

This is another post that is long overdue... I'm finding it hard to keep up at the moment! Spring not only brings great food, somehow the whole world seems to wake up and after having been stuck at home during the winter, all if a sudden you've got more social engagements than you can actually handle. Well, at least that's what seems to happen to me. Time to be a little selfish now and catch up on some posting before I whizz off to New York at the end of the week!
We had a sweet little soirée at a friend's house a few weeks back, where we spoilt an interesting crowd of people with traditional Austrian food. Martina made some great spreads which we nibbled with a glass of Prosecco in hand while waiting for a German-Mexican couple arriving from Frankfurt and getting completely lost in the jungle that is Greater London.
Next up was our Schweinsbraten cook-off: a bit like that "Ready, steady, cook" show on television - with our children judging who does the best roast pork - although we refused to be judged, calling it a "friendly", rather than a cooking competition.
For dessert, I decided to make some curd dumplings in three variations - struggling a bit with the fact that even though you can buy curd here, the consistency is very different... much wetter than anything I would buy in Austria. But we managed, adding loads of semolina until we achieved a dough that was managable.
The three variations were plain dumplings rolled in poppy seeds, plain dumplings rolled in toasted almonds and an apple & cinnamon version rolled in toasted pecans, all served on Martina's delicious gingered rhubarb & strawberry compote Unfortunately, I didn't manage to take notes for the latter, but I shall try and make one myself very soon, so stay tuned!